Reddit reviews Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain Workbook: The Definitive, Updated 2nd Edition
We found 9 Reddit comments about Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain Workbook: The Definitive, Updated 2nd Edition. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
PU92269781585429226Brand New Item / Unopened ProductPenguin Putnam Inc.
Sell the wheel and clay. You aren't going to use them in your apartment and they'll just sit around and take up space, are a pain to move around and every time you see them you'll feel like you abandoned your hobby. Sell them and take the money and enroll in a class or get access to a proper studio you can use. You can always buy another wheel and clay in the future when things settle down.
Btw, there is no harm in not touching clay for a while. It's like when you learned to ride a bike, you'll always remember how to throw. Yeah, you will be a bit wobbly for a bit but you'll pick it up.
To keep your creative juices flowing, I suggest that in lieu of clay you consider picking up a pencil and learn to draw. Go buy the workbook for Drawing on the Right Side of your Brain (https://www.amazon.com/Drawing-Right-Side-Brain-Workbook/dp/1585429228) and give it a try. Not only will it improve your drawing skills for pottery ideas but it will teach you how to see as an artist, an extremely valuable skill.
If you don't mind giving you tips from my experience after 20+ years drawing, i'll bullet list it and you're welcome to add-on or change anything. I'll give you my own tl;dr at the end.
My TL;DR
I've spent my whole life drawing. I'm 30 now and my mom says when I was 3 I picked up a crayon and drew a witch and it looked like a witch. Ever since then, my family only ever bought my art supplies for birthday and christmas. I spent my younger years thinking i'd animate for Disney, then I discovered comic books. I eyeballed the characters and drew them over and over till I could draw them from memory. Eventually I was making my own.
I was slatted to attend an art college out of high school, but money and family fell through and I was left, literally, heartbroken. Feeling as if I wasn't good enough, I spent the next 3 years working and not doing any art at all. Eventually I couldn't put it off any longer and I decided to start up again. Still drawing based on other artists, my style developed very slowly. I had the usual artist anger of feeling stagnant and then eventually getting over the hump.
I've dabbled with online webcomics, i've made tattoos for folks, and i've done some character designs, but it wasn't until last year that I decided that I should take my love of character concept design and try and put it to use. I googled "good video game schools" after having a bad run in with art institute, and found a place here in Washington called Digipen.
I was accepted and part of my summer assignment was to purchase the book "Drawing with the Right side of the brain". Honestly, i'd never been much for reading books to further my art, but considering I had to do this for my summer assignment, I did. I've been doing exactly as they instructed me, and after practicing with the portions of the head and etc, I immediately noticed a difference.
http://sammiblackrabbit.deviantart.com/art/Riverwind-comparison-390032834
the right side is a sketch I did the night before. The left side is one I did the next day. I was floored by the improvement. I know my style isn't what some like, but for me I felt 100x better with my progress and that was just a single night.
Working with this book has been so inspiring to me and so amazing.
I will say that I too had started out with pen and paper and hesitantly moved to digital, but paint tool sai makes it so easy to sketch, line and color all in the same place. Tablets make it that much more joyful and I feel like i'm unlimited in my creativity when I work digitally.
I hope some of this helps, and I hope you find your groove :)
That sounds about right. The most important thing is to stay loose while you draw. Doing so will allow you to lay down neat, confident lines.
A good thing to practice are large strokes and loose circles and ovals. That way you can avoid chicken scratching (admittedly I am guilty of this, oddly enough, only when I'm trying to sketch something out of imagination)
Anyway if you haven't already looked into, you should check out drawing from the right side of the brain. You may have heard it in some peoples rants/posts (negative or positive), but I found it to be quite helpful. In fact, I would recommend the workbook over the text
http://www.amazon.com/Drawing-Right-Side-Brain-Workbook/dp/1585429228/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1368044031&sr=8-1&keywords=drawing+from+the+right+side+of+the+brain+workbook
Anyway, god speed dude, and I hope to see some of your stuff here or on any of the neat art-related subreddits :)
Betty Edwards Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain Workbook
this is where to get it and this is what it does
You are now Super Saiyan, enjoy
I'm going to play devil's advocate and not recommend Drawing on the right side of the brain.
The exercises are standard introduction to drawing exercises, which are fine, but the text is ... really debatable.
She took "Quit drawing symbols" and applied all kinds of psychology to it, when it's important to just stop drawing symbols.
The book's exercises itself are great however, if you can get your hands on the workbook instead, I would recommend that because it's just all the exercises with 5% of the text.
The most important part of drawing is actually doing it, especially when you're just starting out.
Also, I've heard good things about Keys To Drawing
Yes! It's this book: Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards (Amazon link)
I've used it and the exercises are excellent. There's also a workbook, but I haven't tried that one.
What the book does is giving you a bunch of exercises that pull you out of your subjective perception of the world. Instead you start looking at value, angles, shapes, ...
After a week of practicing, I started to see the world differently just when sitting in class or walking down the street. It was amazing to see so much more detail!
There's a few notes about the book:
After going through this book, also draw for fun, from imagination or follow a book like Fun with A Pencil by Andrew Loomis (linked in the sidebar). Drawing from imagination has to be practiced on its own.
It's all about mileage - putting pen to paper and going at it! :)
You can learn 4 years worth of highschool art classes in about 3 months if you want to.
Pick up this workbook. Go through it exactly as instructed. One lesson a day should be fine. If you have enough time every day (2+ hours) you should do these lessons too. There's even a subreddit for feedback: /r/ArtFundamentals
After a few months you will have a strong foundation in observational and constructional drawing. Afterwards you can either continue your studies in traditional art or pirate a copy of photoshop and do the digital painting lessons here.
I got my brother the workshop version of the book astragal recommended. It has good exercises that guide you through different concepts. Anything you want to sketch in particular?
For USD40 minues shipping: